


Oil and Shade

by LineageOfWhimsy (WingGuardian)



Category: Homestuck, MS Paint Adventures
Genre: Angst, Death, Established Relationship, M/M, Soft Porn, Timelines, sadfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-10
Updated: 2014-10-10
Packaged: 2018-02-20 14:53:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2432816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WingGuardian/pseuds/LineageOfWhimsy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It sloshes in his lungs as if it were water. It distends his belly with shadows and starlight and steals the very air from him. He would have been the Heir of Breath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Oil and Shade

**Author's Note:**

  * For [JDoftheGods](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JDoftheGods/gifts).



> Written for a tumblr prompt. By the time this is over you can probably guess what the prompt might've been.
> 
> Feedback is greatly appreciated.

Bro has always been gruff with his actions, as if treating someone delicately was never something he ever became accustomed to (and the horror stories about Dave raised in the wilds of Houston's sky scrapers attested to this), even after he picked up a much younger lover who couldn't match his muscles or physical strength. 

Being gentle... this is a thing Bro is learning to do now. Last time he heaved John into his arms and tossed him onto the bed, snatched his wrists and pressed them into the mattress with all his weight the brunette had come away with bruises dark and thick on his skin. They'd ached for days—all of him had, though John denied it.

When coughs started to beat a rhythm in the background of their lives, medicine cabinets began filling with vile syrups, vapor rubs meant to clear the sinuses, and suddenly swords or puppets or machines of various complexity propped in the corners of every room were replaced with humidifiers.

The day John dropped out of all but two of his college courses and reduced his hours at his job to part time Bro called up the clubs he DJ'd at every Thursday through Saturday and told them they could only have him one night a week and to _'Fuckin' deal with it'_. The website got a shiny new makeover to hype up the extra.

Weeks later, John and Bro are sitting on the couch together. Bro is going over their finances alone, pretending John isn't attempting to sneak a look at them.

The numbers aren't promising. Only one night a week of DJing and the reduced income from John's job, combined with several trips to the doctor and those two nights in the ER after John coughed up black, oily sludge has wrung their savings dry.

Bro glances over to John, watching him reading a book, peering carefully from the side-angle of his eyes, uncovered by his shades.

His black haired lover is much paler than he should be, already on the fair side naturally, with harsh dark rings under his eyes and shadowing the space under his jaw, around his Adam's apple and over the narrow expanse of his thinning chest, abusive looking, accusatory.

 Violent.

John rarely leaves without a scarf or turtleneck on anymore, lest whilst holding his hand Bro be treated to horrified, angry glares; the terribly mottled appearance of the bruising on John's face and neck look—damning. They know what people think.

Even though by now they both know it's not bruising, it's the settling of oil turned to a viscous goop under John's skin. It's blue and purple and green as any oil slick, and it slips under his skin from nowhere, only to be caught in the muscles and blood of John's real body and turned into blockages that are slowly suffocating the boy who, in another world and another time, would have been a God of wind and air.

Unable to look at the dark stains anymore, Bro gets himself up off the fold-out sofa and goes to the kitchen to throw a heat-pack into the microwave that no longer holds _shuriken_ or smuppets or cherry bombs, but smells of lilac and lavender and mint from the herb-pillows John is always sleeping on now to reduce the aches in his bones and help keep his sinuses relaxed.

He stands there, impatient for the timer to go off, hearing the faint echo of John trying to dislodge something in his chest. It makes Bro anxious to be in another room without John. But the pages of the book John's reading keep turning, so the feeling is pushed down. Thirty seconds later the microwave beeps at him loudly in annoyance. Bro grabs the pack shaped like an airplane pillow and returns to the living room, holding it out for John to take and loop around his neck.

“Thank you,” John rasps at him, smiling and taking the hot pillow that reeks of lavender and honey and enough peppermint to drown Santa. He sighs in contentment when it settles behind his neck and over his collarbones. The book is set aside in favor of dipping his head back and closing his eyes to enjoy the heat while it lasts. Bro watches him, mouth a hard line and sits next to John again, stiff.

His papers are mussed in a way they were not when he went to the kitchen. Eyes narrowing, he shoots John a suspicious look.

“I saw the bills,” John explains without opening his eyes. “We're behind on everything.”

“We're just _fine_ , kiddo.” Bro refutes. “Don' worry yer pretty head about it.”

“Mm,” John replies, lashes fluttering. “Site traffic is down by like 78%, Bro.”

Bro shrugs. “Exaggeration.”

“Not according to the site statistics!” John huffs. “I saw them. C'mon, Bro, you can tell me what's happening without me falling apart, I promise.” The book is set aside and wide eyes as blue as the midday sky turn on Bro sternly.

“What good does it do ya to know? Ain't nuthin' you can do 'bout it. We'll be fine, kid.”

“Stop calling me 'kid' it's creepy. I can totally help. My work will give my hours back if I want them—”

“No.”

“--Or we could put some new shit on the website. Maybe something different?” His suggestion is out of his mouth like a shot. Bro raises an eyebrow at him above the rim of his pointed shades.

“Oh?”

“Yeah! I mean,” John pauses to readjust the pillow around his neck (which is already too cool to feel good, dammit) and clear his throat. “I could... you could put me in the videos.”

The other eyebrow shoots up to join it's bushy neighbor.

“You've never let me film ya before. Why now?” He can't say the thought isn't really fucking tempting. And arousing. Damn kid.

“We need the money, Bro, and we can't afford to leave the house as much now--” John bites it off, feeling guilty, feeling oil like tar sticking to his vocal chords and dripping off the back of his tongue. “'Sides... I've been thinking of saying 'yes' to it for a while.” That part is true at least, says the dusting of red on John's cheeks.

That definitely has Bro's attention. As much as he loves the little dork just sitting beside him, the kid could never keep up with his libido even when he was healthy as a clam. There's an interest in his gut that does not want to pass up the opportunity.

“Fuck, John, you **completely** sure?”

“Mhm,” John ducks his chin, letting a mischievous grin grow on his face.

“Fuck,” Bro repeats. He twists on the futon, taking John's (bony, so bony) shoulders and holding them tightly, crushing his lips against the smaller man's own. John hums softly and turns, clinging to Bro, kissing him with a smile.

“Wanna rehearse?”

“ _Fuck!_ ”

–

John can barely breathe sometimes. His throat becomes blocked by gelatinous masses of slow moving black. Heavy and thick and if he opens his mouth and says, _'Ahh--'_ it can be seen lingering in the back of his mouth, as black as licorice and staining his tongue and teeth.

It's nearly impossible to cough up, clinging to his tonsils and palette like gum. John falls to his knees, coughing and hacking and gagging and dripping black saliva, eyes bulging wide and wet with tears. Each breath is a battle, each cough a drain on his energy.

Sometimes Bro is there, sometimes he is not. When he is the man has beaten John's back black and blue trying to help him hock it up out of his lungs. He's tried the Heimlich maneuver and on one occasion sent John to the hospital with cracked ribs performing CPR when he stopped breathing during a nap.

(The hospital staff can't see the oil, slimy and cloying, stinking of earth and fire, sulfuric, they diagnose him with pulmonary edema, call it a white liquid, thick like puss, infection, and call it pleural effusion when the oil starts to constrict around the outside of John's lungs. They do two extractions of fluid. They think it's pneumonia, they think it's cancer, they think John's going to—)

John doesn't work anymore. He doesn't go to any more classes either. Loans have been taken out on every credit card they can get approved for and Jake has sent them money and Roxy has too and it helps but they have their problems (Jade, Dave who's with Rose but— at least they aren't—)-- Insurance rates are through the roof and don't cover everything and John has _a pre-existing condition_ and nothing can be done.

But John is still alive. The pain never goes away, aching deep and profound, the pressure never letting up on the branch of webs in the bone. John tries not to talk about it.

He's still a smartass and a a dick and he is constantly hiding Bro's cameras and replacing swords with pies (where does he even get them?) and drawing angry eyebrows on the smuppets. Part of this, perhaps, could be in protest of Bro veto-ing activities John actually enjoys. Violent video games, all-night movie marathons with easily inhaled popcorn kernals, and blow jobs.

That one was hard to give up, considering any action taken towards his dick is action Bro approves of quite enthusiastically, but the harder it becomes for John to breathe normally when his mouth and throat were not being stuffed full of cock the less enticing the idea suffocating his boyfriend on his man-meat became. John thought it meant the end of their relationship. He'd worried, and fretted, and agitated himself into fainting while trying to cook dinner.

That night love was made very gently, tender fingers trailing over the maps of terrain long conquered. Bro held John as delicately as a man like him could do, taking his little lover with smooth undulating thrusts, holding John in his lap as lying down meant weight on his lungs meant coughing and choking and nearly solid oil spat onto their bed. 

\--

John features in Bro's most successful movies to date. They cover him with make up or paint or felt bibs and make the colors of his skin look intentional. The first one was mild, almost too mundane. It was simply John rocking himself slowly back and forth as Bro's disembodied hand holds a green smuppet with a long proboscis steady, the bulbous nose slipping in and out of the boy's body in wet, easy movements. John moaning loudly with each thrust, hamming it up for the camera that only gets flashes of his face now and then. That short paid off rent for the month and it was such a relief to know that they wouldn't be kicked out of the apartment.

After that came a slightly more daring film. That somehow translated into riding the nose of a smuppet whose rump was weight down to make it a functional seated dildo, while several other smuppets squeaked (squeaks added in post) with his movement, taped onto his mostly naked body to look as if they were crawling over him. On the purposefully, sloppily cut together video John whimpers and wails as if he were in line to see his once-favorite actors live and the camera zooms in on his face. It's embarrassing and he hides under the blanket the rest of the day.

Viewer response is amazing. Requests pour in to see more of John, beg to see him take two, three, four smuppets in him and for his pale skin to be covered in the Koolaid used to make imaginary smuppet cum. Income from the video pays off all their back payment utility bills, repays Roxy (who is struggling, but, _fuck_ , they can't go to _New York_ —) and fills the fridge.

They're happy, relieved, a weight has lifted.

Until the black smears on John's skin begin painting his stomach and steals his appetite. His belly distends with midnight and stars and thick black puss and they spend everything else they have left to take John in to have it drained, and his lungs and chest as well.

Tubes and plastic bags fill with oil and starlight flecking and flickering white-yellow in the green and purple and black swirls and the doctors shake their heads, baffled by the _puss_ and infection they've drawn out of John. They don't see the orbit of an entire planet in the ink.

Bro carries John back into their apartment two days later, the pamphlet for a place sick people wait to die wrinkled and crammed into his back pocket. John can barely talk. Everything hurts and it feels like he's drowning and his body is so heavy.

John eats nothing from the fridge and it all goes bad.

The last production ever to feature John Egbert involves more smuppet than Bro thought the boy could ever handle. He's forced by stern blue eyes to bring out his deluxe pieces. Ribbed and textured noses, vibrators; huge, massive proboscis that look more like eggplants. John insists that Bro use them all on him, and Bro complies, out of options.

Each new toy wrenches more strength away from John than he should have left. ( _“I'm a tough cookie,”_ John breathed more than once, _“I can't be defeated by puppet dong.”_ ) The plan is to record at least a couple hours of action and Bro will release it in small segments over a long period of time. It takes hours to get enough usable content, and Bro has to carry his crying lover into the bedroom afterward.

(Somewhere in the lurch of _extended_ stay and _terminal_ Bro quits all his DJ jobs and sells his turntables. They both weep that night)

“Bro, Bro,” John whimpers, his voice tiny. There's stains of black all down his chin and neck and his teeth are dark gray. His lips are as black as pitch.

“Shh, I got ya,” Bro turns John onto his side and wraps around him. He can't bear looking at the devastation clinging to the boy's emaciated body, weighted only by the putrid filth clogging his organs and seeping rancid and acidic from under his tongue.

“--ro, lov—loff you,” The hard consonants slur. John swallows as if someone crammed melted asphalt into his esophagus and it grates on his nerves and in his ears and he'd sob if he weren't so dehydrated and it didn't hurt so much (he convulses anyways, and when he cries the tears are gray and thick). Bro kisses him anyways. He holds John together with the might of his hands, broad and encompassing and they spread over the X, Y, Z of John's ribs as if to hold him back. He can feel the sluice of slippery death under John's skin, as if it were running from Bro's touch.

He doesn't sleep that night. His forehead is pressed to the stark ridges of John's spine, listening and feeling his lungs expand with every labored breath. Not one does he want to miss.

\--

John wakes up in the morning. The black bruise of his chest is horrifying. They wrap him in a massive hoodie and pretend it isn't as if oil was poured into his blood and is floating to the surface, segregated and at agitated odds with a substance it cannot mix with.

Bro coaxes him into eating cereal with him, dry, because they've let all their food spoil and the money sent into the website won't transfer into the bank for another two days and they still need to pay the minimum on the first hospital bill and Bro feels like John isn't the only one who is drowning and he hates himself for thinking that. Bro hurries room to room, looking for problems to fix, weary and laden with his burdens and always on edge. He's just leaving the bathroom when the smoke alarm goes off in the kitchen, where John is.

Bro hasn't run so fast in his life, more than flashstepping to the kitchen, terrified and seeking his lover. He finds him quickly; John's standing at the oven, his bruised eyes wide and nervous. There's smoke curling off the burners, twining into the air.

“Shit!” Bro runs and grabs a newspaper, flailing at the fire alarm, willing it to turn off. John is pushing at a window to open it. “The fuck happened?” Bro demands gruffly, coughing, irritated by the relentless squeal of the device.

“I don't know!” John moans, doubling over to hack and wheeze, confused. “I was going t-to cook, but the...” He never came up with a real name for the black liquid invading their lives. But it's oil, they both know it's oil, and it carries the weight of an unborn world inside John's body. “--it just... a drop fell on the burner and it just—it just blew up!”

The response is a confounded, _"Cook WHAT?"_ because they have _nothing_ and to snatch John and push him from the room and onto the futon (which is unfolded at all times now, so John can sleep wherever he needs to) before opening every window. The apartment falls into blessed silence. Bro braces his hands against the bottom of a window sill and stares out into the skyline of Houston and counts to ten, fighting back his fears and tears with the muscles of a master.

When he whirls around John is curled up, agonized by a surge of Hell in his body, sapping his strength and choking his breaths into small gasps, too quiet to even allow Bro the courtesy of not looking like an angry asshole ignoring his boyfriend-fiance-partner (husband on every medical sheet and fuck Texas for making that so hard--) while he strained to draw air and swallowed black bile a thousand times to clear his airways that are never clear anymore.

Cursing, Bro is at John's side instantly, turning John onto his hands and knees with a thick arm around his hips to support him. He beats on John's back again, praying they won't have anymore cracked ribs to ignore or a broken spine but he just wants his boyfriend-fiance-partner to _breathe DAMMIT_ and when John doesn't Bro shoves two fingers into his mouth and _pulls_ at the blockage, tearing inches of a thick black scar out of John's throat and then covering his mouth to mute the screams.

John convulses in utter, rippling agony. The badge of tar drips black oil and red blood and John sobs and writhes and suffers and Bro curses out every apology he can until John stills, raining tears-but-not on his bare arms.

Breath comes easier for a day. John can't talk or eat or sleep for the pain but he's breathing deeper than he has in _daysweeksmonths_ and he doesn't resent Bro for hurting him, even when he quails at the thought of it happening again.

\--

Two days later John's hands are purple and black and blue and green and swollen and useless and he sits curled up on the futon and nothing Bro says will get him to eat the soup their kindly neighbor gave Bro that morning. His throat hurts so bad he wishes he could pass out, but sleep is near intolerable now. They don't have sex anymore, but Bro will hold him close even so, and John will apologize in Morse code tapped into Bro's skin because he can't talk anymore.

The final segment of the porn releases brings in enough money to cover just the bare minimums, but it is enough for now. Time is winding down, and money is the least of their worries, not when John's legs have gone black and his eyes have too. He can still see, but the color has been stolen. The sclera a muddy, awful gray, pictures of disease.

They start saying their good-byes without words. Touches that linger, foreheads pressed together, mornings that never leave the bed, baths together. A diet of cereal that can only last so long. They need groceries, and badly. John's lost enough weight to match the end of the world and Bro has dropped pounds as well, too stressed out to eat properly. But John's insistent, and the nearest grocery store doesn't deliver but there's a convenience store around the corner and they sell fruits there, right?

So Bro leaves, he promises to come back in moments, that he'll flashstep every stair and block and John won't even have time to miss him and they kiss because the taste of oil and sulfur is only so horrible as sipping gasoline but not enough to stop them and then Bro is gone and John is left staring, hurt and scared and so, so horribly overwrought with sorrow it is almost madness.

The line at the convenience store is held up by an angry man demanding lottery tickets in a voice stained with alcohol and just when Bro is impatient enough to steal everything in his basket or forget it all— time… stops.

Fire and glass rain onto the world and Hell all over again except it's not, it much, much worse, it's an explosion from a high rise just around the corner and the sky is neon green with unnatural flames and sirens fill the air along with screams and the sound of collapsing lives. The basket hits the dirty linoleum as Bro runs from the store and the cowering men at the counter and into the smoke and gloom and the heat of an already unbearably hot Texas day.

He can't do anything though. There's nothing one can do to stop the march of destruction heralded by the apocalypse.

Where home used to be is nothing. It is fire and smoke, hurling winds and the green fires of alien madness; it is glass and metal beams and drywall and insulation and _love_ , _life_ , and _ever after_ and a boy who was drowning in oil, combustible, volatile oil, whose organs sloshed with tar and _time_ and an ocean filled with fire. His very veins a death march beneath his skin.

Bro watches the world end filled with lead, feels as if he can hear the terrified, tortured screams of his boyfriend-fiance-partner, his _Egbert_ , his _John_ , hears the lesson teasing the ears of his little black haired lover, the sibilant whispers from the darkest ring:

 

_You cannot survive in a doomed timeline, John Egbert, the Heir of Breath who never breathed_

**Author's Note:**

> For my dear friend Jchanofthegods, who prompted this fic, but probably never expected it to become what it is.


End file.
